Jordan ends Royals’ season with sweep

Published November 6, 2013 at 1:41 pm

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The season came to an end for the Watertown-Mayer volleyball team last Tuesday, Oct. 29, in the subsection semifinals with a 3-0 loss to Jordan.

Except for a 25-12 loss in the second set, the match was actually close most of the way. Jordan earned a hard-fought 25-22 win in the first set, and had to fight to put the Royals away, 25-23, in the third set.

The Royals came out of the gates strong, enjoying several small leads in the early going of the first set. Even after Jordan surged ahead a bit, the Royals rallied late, pushing the first set all the way down to the wire.

“The first game was great,” Watertown-Mayer coach Andrea Raser said of a match that was played at New Prague High School. “We played great defense against a very aggressive Jordan offense. Our serving was tough, which helped to keep Jordan out of system.”

Jordan started to put things together in the second set, though, when they cruised to an easy win.

“During Game 2, we got stuck in a serve receive rotation and allowed Jordan to rally off several points in a row,” Raser said. “Our passing game was off, and we couldn’t run our offense. The girls stayed tough defensively, but it’s tough to score points when you are constantly playing defense. We kept the ball up, but struggled to put it down on their side.”

As dominant as Jordan was in the second set, though, the Royals came back strong in the third set. Ultimately, it just wasn’t enough to stave off elimination.

“In the third game, the girls came back strong and battled to the very end of the match,” Raser said.

Ashley Vealetzek led the way offensively for the Royals with 13 kills. She also added three blocks and nine digs on defense.

Lily Reinert added five kills and Ashley Kelzer added four for the Royals. Kelzer also had a team-high 16 digs, and Kiana Paulson had 13. Chelsea Wandersee had 24 assists.

The Royals finished the season with a 13-15 overall record.

“This was a awesome group of varsity players that I was blessed to have this year as my first year as the head coach of the Royals,” Raser said. “They never stopped improving and wanting to do better, and their postseason play showed that.”